The subject matter described and/or illustrated herein relates generally to electrical connectors, and more particularly, to electrical connectors that are mounted on printed circuits.
Electrical connectors are commonly used to interconnect a wide variety of electrical components. Some electrical connectors are mounted on printed circuits (sometimes referred to as “circuit boards”) for electrically connecting the printed circuit to another electrical component. Such electrical connectors include electrical contacts held by a housing that is mounted on the printed circuit. The electrical contacts include mating contacts that engage complementary contacts of the other electrical component or a mating connector thereof. The electrical contacts also include mounting contacts that mount to the printed circuit. For example, the mounting contacts may be surface mount contacts that engage electrical traces and/or electrical pads on a surface of the printed circuit. Another example of the mounting contacts includes pin contacts and/or eye-of-the needle contacts that are received within vias of the printed circuit. Corresponding mating and mounting contacts define different portions of the same electrical path through the electrical connector. The corresponding mating and mounting contacts may be a single integral electrical contact, may engage each other directly, or may be electrically connected to each other via an intermediary component, such as a lead frame, an intermediary contact, and/or the like.
The printed circuit on which the electrical connector is mounted is typically rigidly held by a support structure, for example, within a larger system such as a personal computer, a server, or another electrical device. Accordingly, for at least some known electrical connectors mounted on printed circuits, it may be difficult to align the electrical and mating connectors for mating because only the position and orientation of the mating connector can be manipulated. Specifically, it may be difficult to position and/or orient the mating contacts of the electrical connector relative to the complementary contacts of the mating connector in a manner that enables the mating contacts to mate with the complementary contacts. For example, a mating contact may not mate with a complementary contact if the contacts are aligned off-center relative to each other. Aligning the electrical connector with the mating connector may be especially problematic when the printed circuit is mounted within a tight and/or enclosed space where it may be difficult to manipulate the mating connector and/or see the relative position and orientation of the electrical and mating connectors.